1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to attractants for both male and female adult Lepidopteran insects, particularly the cabbage looper, soybean looper, tobacco budworm, tobacco hornworm, and tomato hornworm.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Insects of the order Lepidoptera encompass a large number of pests responsible for substantial crop losses, reduced crop quality, and high production costs worldwide. Presently, the available monitoring systems and attracticidal baits for the majority of these pests utilize sex pheromones that are attractive to only one sex, usually the nonproductive male.
Recently, flowers of the Japanese honeysuckle, Lonicera japonica, were recognized as important ovipositional hosts of two important species of Lepidoptera, the tobacco budworm, Heliothis virescens, and the corn earworm, Helicoverpa zea (Pair, 1994, Environ. Entomol., 23(4):906-911). The chemistry of various Lonicera species has been partially described in several previous reports. Wu and Fang (1981, Acta Chemica Sinica, 38:573-579) analyzed the essential oil from flowers of L. japonica, and reported that linalool and linalool oxide C were the major identified constituents, and that pinene, 1-hexene, cis-3-hexen-1-ol, .alpha.-terpineol, geraniol, benzyl alcohol, .beta.-phenylethanol, carvacol, eugenol, and some substituted furans were present in lesser amounts. In studies of pheromones and volatile honeysuckle attractants for the honeysuckle aphid, Hedin et al. (1991, J. Agric. Food Chem., 39:1304-1306) analyzed hexane-extractable volatiles from leaves and flowers of Lonicera species. Methyl esters, two ketones, seven alcohols, and three terpenoids (.DELTA.-carene, (E)-.beta.-faresene, and (E,E)-farnesol) were identified in the plant samples.